“This season especially, with the new generation cars, we can expect it to be particularly exciting,” he said. “These new cars tend to slide easily and in Monaco there’s not much room to drift off line.”

34 comments on “Ferrari making gains with F14 T – Raikkonen”

I hope this upgrades suit Kimi more. Not saying Alonso will be sitting and waiting (if there are upgrades both of them will benefit from it), just that Kimi is better than what we have seen from him until now. His 2 victories in Lotus, which was not the best car, prove that he can do better. (waiting for comments saying Alonso never had the best car at Ferrari either in 3,2,1…)

@omarr-pepper Not to mention his WDC with Ferrari also proves he can do better, but I take your point that last year’s Lotus was probably relatively worse than his WDC winning Ferrari compared to the other cars in their respective fields in those seasons.

People are trying to make a HUGE deal out of Alonso being a racing god when he’s obviously not! People always talk about him having a bad car and such but are these people totally forgetting 2010 & 2012 when the car was AT LEAST very close to Red Bull, almost equal??

I’m not particularly an Alonso or Vettel fan myself, so from a personal preference point of view I don’t favor either.

In 2012 Ferrari struggled to get the Ferrari in the top 5 on the grid and were in serious danger to miss Q3 at the start of the year in Melbourne. Meanwhile the Redbulls were among the fastest cars right from the start the year. It was the only in tricky conditions that Alonso got his Ferrari at the front in qualy which actually underlines his class.

In 2010 the Ferrari was better than in 2012 but the RedBulls were miles ahead in terms of pace, amd it was driver mistakes (from both Vettel and Webber) and reliability issues that prevented them from deciding the title earlier than they did.

If anything, Vettel should have won both 2010 and 2012 with a bigger margin than he did and Webber should have been much closer as well.

I really feel that a lot of drivers would have won the championship had they driven for RedBull the last 4 yrs. and there is no doubt in my mind that Alonso, Raikkonen and Hamilton would have won 4 like Vettel did.

Oops that was meant as a response to Michael not JuanJ…. for saying that in 2010&2012 the Ferrari was almost equal to the RedBull.

To add to that, you could say that the McLaren was almost equal to the RedBull but especially in 2012 (imho Lewis’ his best year as a driver) RedBull proved to be a better team as a whole (less strategical mistakes, pitstop inconsistentcy, unreliability and more effective development)

@omarr-pepper@kingshark and everybody else, there are some very important points that should be raised here when comparing Vettel to Alonso.

Firstly, Alonso made a series of catastrophic blunders which were driving errors that cost him far more than four points over the course of the season.

Yes, the Red Bull was the fastest car in 2010, but you have to look slightly further down the order as to who finished fourth in the third fastest/second most reliable car as to who drove better.

In 2012, neither Red Bull nor Ferrari actually had the best car. Vettel suffered numerous mechanical failures in 2010 and in 2012 (and one in 2013 and so far two in 2014) which cost him dear yet were not his fault. Alonso has had far fewer mechanical problems (in 2012, he only had one major issue, in qualifying at Monza where he started in the top 10).

Yes Alonso probably drove better than Vettel in 2012, but the German was absolutely supreme in 2011 and in 2013, it’s not as if Webber came anywhere near over the course of a season at all.

Alonso is far from a driving God. I don’t think any of the current drivers make my top 5 of all time. He can be just as flawed as Vettel, Hamilton, Raikkonen and Button, and as we have seen in the past, sometimes even more.

Firstly, Alonso made a series of catastrophic blunders which were driving errors that cost him far more than four points over the course of the season.

In 2010, Alonso lost maybe 10 points in Monaco (Webber was unstoppable but 2nd was possible), 3 in China, 12 in Silverstone, and he was running outside the points in Belgium. Vettel lost 25 points in Turkey, 18 points in Belgium, and 10 points in Hungary.

Vettel’s errors were more costly than Alonso’s, despite the fact that Alonso made more in numbers.

In 2012, neither Red Bull nor Ferrari actually had the best car. Vettel suffered numerous mechanical failures in 2010 and in 2012 (and one in 2013 and so far two in 2014) which cost him dear yet were not his fault. Alonso has had far fewer mechanical problems (in 2012, he only had one major issue, in qualifying at Monza where he started in the top 10).

Vettel had two reliability issues, Valencia and Monza. Alonso had 1, that’s not a big difference. The difference in speed between Red Bull and Ferrari was greater than a single more mechanical retirement.

Apart from Malaysia, Spain, and Monza I geniunely can’t think of a single race where the F2012 was faster than the RB8. Even in Germany, Red Bull seemed quicker than Ferrari.

the German was absolutely supreme in 2011 and in 2013, it’s not as if Webber came anywhere near over the course of a season at all.

He was supreme those seasons, but did you notice that those were also the two seasons where Red Bull were heads and shoulders above the rest? Vettel only looks a clear cut above the rest when his car is, in the 1st half of the 2012 season his car was very comparable to Alonso’s Ferrari, arguably a little better, yet he was thoroughly overshadowed by Alonso during this period of time.

I can’t see Vettel pulling off an Alonso-2012 season anytime soon, and you’d have to go 7 years back to remember the last time Alonso was 1 second/lap slower than his teammate on average like Vettel was in China a few weeks back.

Vettel isn’t as able to drive a poor car as Alonso, his racecraft isn’t as good and he struggles more with an ill-handling car. This is not something I’ve snatched from thin air, but something that is supported by historical evidence.

If Vettel and Alonso teamed up in the dominant 2002 Ferrari, they’d be evenly matched. However, if they teamed up in the current F14T, Alonso would beat Vettel by almost the same margin that he is currently beating Kimi by.

Raikkonen can barely be counted as a newcomer only 5 races in. And whether Piquet/Massa are worse than Webber etc. (which I would say they are aside from Bourdais) is missing the point I just made- Alonso’s team mates were effectively contracted to be number 2.

And how do you know, because you’ve verbally read Massa’s contract, right?

Massa was allowed to beat Alonso in Australia 2010, Malaysia 2010, Malaysia 2011, China 2011, and allowed to stay ahead for half the race in Australia 2013. That’s hardly how a contractually obligated #2 would be treated.

The only times Alonso was favored was because he was already miles ahead of Massa in the championship. If Vettel could beat Ricciardo in similar fashion, he’d the the undisputed #1 of his team too.

I said ‘effectively’ because I watched them race, saw them move over and not get equal upgrades. I think to suggest that Alonso wasn’t given number 1 status from a only few races into each season is naive. And to suggest it for Piquet, a driver who was asked to crash on Alonso’s behalf, would be crazy. But I do think Massa did a poor job compared to Alonso anyway, and that of course Alonso has driven fantastically. But for me, the combination of Alonso’s status in his teams and the calibre of his team mates means he’s had an easier job of dominating them.

There are so many excuses about Alonso’s teammates it’s laughable

I’m not trying to make excuses, just recognise the situation. As I said, I don’t have an agenda anyway- Alonso is very possibly the best driver on the grid, regardless of his team mate situation. And it wasn’t me who called Alonso a ‘rooster’ and implied Massa was a hen.

Michael, You seem to be forgetting that Vettel only won the WDC over Alonso by 3 points. If Grosjean had not been playing Wrecking Ball in Belgium, then Alonso would have probably won the WDC that year in a car that was close, but not as good as the RBR.
I’m a HAM fan so I don’t give Alonso credit unless he earns it. But I think he’s earned respect as a great driver even if I pull for Lewis to beat him every time.

It appears the other 20 cars are improving even quicker @raceprouk than Ferrari. The problem with Ferrari it seems is that they’re lacking a little bit everywhere, which is much more of an issue than with say Red Bull, whose shortcomings only appear to be regarding the powertrain.

This pathetic efforts at bashing Alonso never seems to stop, dont know what else he needs to do to prove that he is actually the best driver out there. Most people in F1 think so, and Murray Walker said he was most comparable Senna.

Much is made out of what happened with the pitstops in Spain. Its always a conspiracy isnt it? We dont get to hear all the radio transmissions, perhaps Kimi’s tyre’s “came back” after his radio message on lap 10? Perhaps he was offered to do a two stopper but decided against it? Could it just be that Fernando was more aware of what was going on around him? Let put things into perspective here. Kimi is not Felipe. If he is supposedly the No 2 driver, he will tell Ferrari to get stuffed and will walk out.

Like I said above, I recon any of Alonso, Hamilton or Raikkonen would have won 4 titles with RedBull (possibly 5 if you take 2009 in account as well) but I think Hamilton has the edge on Alonso in terms of 1lap pace. Untill 2012 Hamilton would go for the pass instead of taking major points like Alonso but the last three years (2012,2013 and this yr so far) have shown a great deal of race craft maturation from Hamilton.

In my wildest dreams they team up again at Mercedes next year so we could see a battle of the titans for the WDC!